


Why do you linger in the shadows?

by Thaum



Category: The Hobbit (Jackson Movies), The Hobbit - All Media Types, The Hobbit - J. R. R. Tolkien
Genre: Angst, Dark Thranduil, Depression, Hurt No Comfort, Loneliness, Philosophy
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2018-03-24
Updated: 2018-03-24
Packaged: 2019-04-07 03:29:24
Rating: General Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 704
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/14071938
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/Thaum/pseuds/Thaum
Summary: Immortality had never been a gift, but a curse. For a moment, Bilbo understands.





	Why do you linger in the shadows?

**Author's Note:**

> A very short idea, I couldn't get out of my mind.  
> English isn't my first language. Be nice.

For a split moment his heart literally stopped. Unwavering, the elvenking seemed to stare straight into his soul. He felt like stripped to the bone, naked in the light of the Valar, like a deer caught. It may have lasted a second or a lifetime, he never knew. All the following years, he would never be sure, if maybe Thranduil did know of his presence. But he would always remember the frightful feeling he had, the dreadful certainty he attained, when he stared back into his ancient, ice blue eyes.

It would haunt him for the rest of his many days. Thranduil wasn't a kind man. Still, nobody deserved the things, Bilbo realized to be the truth in that moment. He had heard them talk, the men, the dwarves, even wizards and other elves. They were in awe, loved, hated and feared him at the same time. Indifference seemed impossible. And Bilbo lived through the same contradictions, when he first looked at him. He was frozen to the spot in fear, alternately disgusted of his cruelty and admiring his etheral grace and wisdom all the same. He owned a feral beauty, was sharp minded, yet cold hearted and short tempered. There was no room for mediocrity in the king, just for bottomless extremes. His sheer presence demanded submission. He was superior. Untouchable. Distant. But not in that moment. In that moment some unsettling part of him was way too close. Bilbos heart started to beat again, a slow painful throb in his chest and he gasped silently for air. Maybe it was the ring. He always felt strangely attached to the darkness whenever he wore it. It was becoming more and more frightening and addicting, although it seemed to suck something out of him everytime he used it. It left him to be a little more less, than he'd been before. He just wasn't sure, what exactly it was he was starting to miss.

He realized, that being around the elves and their glowing surroundings had dimmed that feeling a little. He felt more like himself again and the horrors he lived through most recently, seemed far away here in these halls. The elves were brightness, pure light and life. But not all of them. In spite of his radiating appearance, there was no such light surrounding the elvenking. And for a moment, when their eyes met, Bilbo understood. For a moment, loss, loneliness and the memories of too many lifetimes crushed him and pressed the air out of his lungs again. For a moment, insanity crept into his thoughts and started to reason with him. And for a single moment, he tumbled down into an endless void, and a cheerful and lighthearted Hobbit felt a desperation so deep, it made him wish for an end of all things. It made him wish for numbness and the darkness touching the corners of his mind seemed more tempting, than anything else ever had. He wanted to fall into it, deeper and deeper until nothing else was left and nothing else would ever matter again. But he couldn't and that caused an anger and fury he hadn't known existed. A fury that burned his insides to ashes and left nothing but ice. Then, Thranduil looked away and it ended abrubtly. Bilbo snapped back into the world, breathless, and reached out for the wall for support. Something solid to hold on. He swallowed hard, his shivering hands clenching the ring. He felt like ripping it off his finger and screaming. Screaming the terrible void in his chest away that threatened to swallow him whole. Screaming until his throat felt as raw, as his insides. Screaming to convince himself again, that the voice in his head wasn't true. That nothing in it was real. He clinged to the advice, Gandalf once gave him. That the real world was out there and not in his head, especially not at the very moment. The advice, he wanted to scream back at this awfully destroyed creature in front of him. That there was more reality in the living world, than in the empty halls of a slipping mind.

But maybe, after thousands of years, it wasn't true anymore. And he understood.

**Author's Note:**

> For the background: I know, it is never mentioned anywhere, but I always believed, that after the war of the ring, Thranduil did not sail and stayed behind as the only Sindar elf. The only thing, that keeps him from loosing his mind is his purpose: the protection of his Silvan people. But finally, all Silvan elves will have disappeared. If they sail to Valinor is questionable (probably they cannot), but they all will fade, somewhen.  
> Thranduil will not fade, otherwise he would have done before. I guess, there is nothing at the other side for him and that frightens him more, than the insanity he finally succumbs to. That is his curse: an eternity alone in his woods, the king of a vanished kingdom.
> 
> I think I will write a little more in that "universe".


End file.
